


Marriage Is Weird

by Paranoxx



Category: Dragon Ball, Vegebul - Fandom
Genre: Family Bonding, Family Fluff, Friendship, Marriage, No Smut, Other, Protectiveness, Vegeta is not an asshole at all, wholesome for the most part
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-20
Updated: 2020-01-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:08:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22343848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paranoxx/pseuds/Paranoxx
Summary: Just a weird little one shot about what it's like to be married when you realize you love being married. And no, Yamcha doesn't die. For now.
Relationships: Bulma Briefs & Vegeta
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Marriage Is Weird

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing. DBZ is the masterwork of Akira Toriyama and it is within his sandbox that I am grateful to play.

Marriage

Marriage was weird.

Because it was important to Bulma and because doing things that were important to Bulma made Vegeta’s life easier, the pair had undergone a civil ceremony that made their union official three months earlier. She had been resplendent in a cream coloured dress that hugged her every curve and made his mouth water at the thought of taking it off of her one button at a time. Vegeta huffed at the memory of the costume she’d made him wear. Personally, if he was going to make a lifetime commitment, Vegeta had wanted to wear his formal armour. But the Woman had insisted that weddings were for women (as most things seemed to be) and she’d wanted him to wear a grey tux with tails. At the time Vegeta had thought it was ridiculous. There was no way the thing allowed for the movement needed to properly defend anything, it had so many layers of heavy fabric. The proud Saiyan had felt like nothing so much a gift-wrapped package.

Right up until he’d actually seen himself in the tailors’ mirror. The suit fit him like a glove, making his every ridge stand out without making him look like he was about to murder anybody. Bulma had smiled so wickedly at him when he’d come out of the fitting room; in a way that promised that she actually would remove the outfit later, one button at a time. Her last touch was the silver pocket watch with a snaked chain.

Looking at himself, the Prince had decided that the tails of the over coat would do as a cape.

They had wanted to keep the ceremony private, but they had needed witnesses. Another stupid human custom. Vegeta knew that Bulma considered Kakarot the obvious choice, but when it came to it he’d gone to the outlands and asked the acerbic Piccolo to stand with him. The Namek was the only one of the Z fighters that he could really stand to be around for any length of time, the tall, green man didn’t speak unless he actually had something to say and Vegeta liked that about him. He also knew the alien could keep a secret. The Namekian had known the truth of Miria Trunks from the beginning and had told no one, not even his own father. 

Bulma had expressed surprise at the choice and at the fact that the stoic fighter had agreed but she made no objection. To Vegeta’s surprise she hadn’t chosen Chichi. Instead, Bulma had asked 18 to be her maid of honour. Vegeta had had to approve of the choice, Krillin’s washing machine wife had looked outstanding in the lavender dress Bulma picked out. She would also keep their secret, even from her tiny husband. 

The actual ceremony was a lot less dramatic than the ones Vegeta had seen in the human movies he’d watched as a way of research. It was because of all that dramatic crap that he had flat out refused to let her drag him to anything resembling a religious house. At the end the Woman had simply turned to him, said her words and then kissed him. Vegeta would never forget that kiss. His _wife_ , breathtakingly beautiful in her finery, smelling of flowers and desire. It was one of the only times that Vegeta had not cared if anyone saw him show the evidence of the attachment he had to her. It was in that moment that he understood the purpose of this very human thing. 

_ Bulma Briefs belonged to him. He, the great Prince of all Saiyans, belonged to her. _

Vegeta had wrapped himself around her, his dark brown tail coming up to twine itself around her slender neck and kissed her until the Woman herself pushed him back in order to catch her breath. 18 and Piccolo stood smiling in a very out of character way by their sides and even the judge had laughed. 

Vegeta remembered their small son staring up at them both, not really understanding what had just happened but knowing that it was important. The lavender hair fell into the little boy’s face and Vegeta couldn’t stop himself from brushing it aside, thinking in the privacy of his own mind how precious these two people were to him. Not caring what anyone thought about him at that moment, the Prince had lifted his heir into his arms and wrapped the other around the waist of his wife. 

Before he was able to whisk them both away, 18 had snapped a photo with the camera that she had been concealing in her bouquet of white lilies. He’d felt the heavy hand of the Namekian on his shoulder and turned to see that rare smile, just as he saw out the corner of his eye that 18 kissed Bulma on the cheek in congratulations. The elderly man on the other side of the desk smiled widely, pleased with his days’ work. Even if the weird groom did have a tail.

“Party at my house!” Bulma cried in the moment before her new and now official mate carried her and their small son out of the office and into the sky. 

Vegeta had tried very hard to avoid the party Bulma held that evening. He’d gone up the roof and secreted himself in the shadows of the Capsule Corp building. Thanks to the extensive security system the Woman had installed, his efforts were less than successful. 

Bulma told her friends that the reason for the party was random. Her corporation had many holdings and she wasn’t questioned when she told them all that she simply needed to celebrate a new and profitable acquisition. There was a huge buffet, music and it was at the behest of Bulma; everyone came, and no one questioned it. Few people ever did.

When the Woman found him on the roof Vegeta had tried to get out of going down to the party. It was the promise of what would happen after that convinced him. Kakarot, sated by the enormous buffet sat next to the Prince at one of the tables. The choice between talking to that idiot or dancing with his mate drove Vegeta to the ballroom floor and he found that he enjoyed it. Bulma was light and graceful, Vegeta could move with her in the fluid way that the music demanded. Holding her tightly against his body was good all by itself. He’d danced with her until it was very late, and people started to go home or retire to any of the many extra rooms on the compound. 

It was then that Vegeta found out for the first time that marriage was weird. It was the custom, according to Bulma, for the hosts to thank the guests for coming as they left. So, unwillingly, he’d stood beside her and watched as she hugged her friends good-bye. 18 and Krillin left; Krillin reaching out to squeeze Vegeta’s shoulder in his always friendly way. The Prince bristled, about to throw the smaller man a pretty fair distance when a firm and aggressive hand took hold of his backside.

Vegeta froze. His new wife, standing very close to him, had her hand on his bottom and squeezed in a way that got his total attention. Krillin gave him a quiet well wish and followed his blonde wife out of the compound. 

Vegeta turned to stare at Bulma. She had never done anything like that before. She looked back at him with a vivid smile and an evil glint in her eyes.

“I own you now,” she’d had whispered near his ear before walking away.

The woman was right. She did. And he loved it.

The night of their wedding was one of the best nights Vegeta had ever lived through. Trunks went to bed without complaint for once, exhausted from the fun of having all the people he loved most around him at the party. He hadn’t even needed a story. 

Dr. and Mrs. Briefs retired to their rooms on the other side of the compound as soon as the party started to wind down. The few people that were staying at the compound went to their respective rooms in good order and Vegeta was happily able to escort his Woman to their own rooms without being bothered by anyone. 

Bulma didn’t do anything in a way that could be forgotten. Their rooms were festooned with candles and twinkling lights, the bed covered in rose petals. She had instructed Vegeta to wait for her while she ‘freshened up’ and had come out of the bathroom in her glorious wedding gown. 

Sitting on the edge of the bed uncertainly, the Prince felt his mouth open and his hands tingle when he saw her. That magnificent woman walking towards him in that dress affected him in a way that nothing in his life had ever done. The look on her face made it worse. 

Before he had time to think about it, Vegeta was up and had her in his arms. Blue hair gathered in his fist, his tail wrapped tightly around her thigh and he took her mouth with a passion that bent her back over his arm. 

There had been about 400 buttons on that dress; a lot to get through and he’d taken his time. Vegeta had taken his time with everything that night. Knowing that the Woman was his, legally, was something that Vegeta hadn’t known would be important to him. He had distained the ceremony, thinking it to be yet another of the idiotic human procedures that meant nothing to him. 

But looking at Bulma, in her expensive dress, having made herself that beautiful just for him…it had meant something. She had said the words that pledged her to him for the rest of their lives and sealed it with a kiss. She had put the dress back on when they were finally alone and let him take it back off with all the slow care that he had later pleasured her with. 

Vegeta had had sex with the Woman many times before that night. It was a measure of their intimacy that it was different. Vegeta had laid her on their bed and worshipped her from her blue hair to her small feet, leaving no part of her skin untouched. It wasn’t sex and he understood the difference. He had made love with his wife. Making love was so much better than sex.

Marriage was weird.

That was three months ago. It had not changed since that most precious of nights. But something else had. 

Vegeta stood at the counter in the kitchens of the Capsule Corp compound steadily eating a huge bowl of cereal. His small son was outside on the bright green lawn, practicing the art of flight with limited success. Vegeta kept a fatherly eye on the boy while spooning crunchy goodness. It was amusing to watch. Trunks could fly. He could also fall. And he did both with hilarious results. Vegeta decided that once he out of cereal, he would go out and at least try to train the little boy. Falling that much was unbecoming of a prince. He laughed to himself, watching his young son use his lavender tail to push himself upright and his hand to rub the sore spot on his forehead. Vegeta was proud that Trunks never once showed the slightest inclination to cry or to get right back up and try again. He could see the soul of the young man he’d met in the boy before him. For all that the brat was a halfling, he was a prince worthy of Vegeta’s lineage. 

“What’s funny?” Bulma asked, sauntering into the kitchen in her minimal pajamas. Vegeta turned to look at his wife. Her hair has a haystack of azure blue mess on her head and she had the distinct appearance of someone who needed coffee. 

Vegeta gestured to the coffee pot on the counter beside him, admiring the length of leg he could see as she moved. Bulma got herself a mug and filled it with strong, black French roast. She had to pass behind the Saiyan Prince to get to it and as she did, he felt her fingers glide over his lower back, just over the highly sensitive root of his long tail. It made him hold his breath for a second. Bulma took a scalding sip of the drink and leaned over the counter to see her son out the window. A moment later she made a humming sound. Vegeta had wrapped his tail around the top of one delectable thigh. 

The Woman’s voice changed pitch abruptly when the tip of the furry appendage flicked upward. Vegeta bit the inside of his cheek at the sound; her sleeping shorts were tiny and it was all too easy to lift the end of his tail to run it over the lace clad slit inside them. He didn’t understand why Bulma even bothered to wear underwear, it would feel better for her without them. 

There was a sharp cry from outside. Vegeta flinched and spun back around to look out the window. His son was lying on his stomach, face planted in the grass, laughing. The boy was hardy, Vegeta had to give him that. No matter how many times he fell, the boy could laugh it off. Vegeta didn’t understand where that sense of humour came from. Vegeta himself did not have one that he was aware of. Turning to the glass had brought the Prince to a place beside Bulma, who also laughed once she was certain that her little boy was not actually hurt. All he would need at the endof this practice session was a warm bath and a cup of hot chocolate.

Her arm came up and she ran the backs of her fingers over the underside of Vegeta’s jaw in a gentle caress that made him shiver. Her fingers were warm from the heat of the coffee cup. 

“Good morning,” she murmured, going boneless when Vegeta used his tail to pull her toward him and bury his face in her mussed hair. He loved to see her like this. She was so much more sexy when she wasn’t in one of her designer outfits and tight, high shoes. He liked her fresh from bed, messy and scantily dressed. When she smelled like sleep and the memory of his mouth and hands on her.

Bulma turned around, bringing her chest flush with his own. Slender arms wrapped around his neck, hands in his hair. Her mouth tasted like coffee when he kissed her and even though that was not a thing Vegeta liked when it was black, it was delicious when he tasted it on her. Everything was.

Vegeta spent the day as he usually did. He trained in the GR, pushing his body to the breaking point. At one point a knocking on the door had distracted him and he’d found a hopeful, blue eyes face staring up at him. Trunks was powerful, so much more so than Vegeta would have ever thought a halfling could be. He’d seen the result in the person of his future son, so vegeta knew that this version of the child could attain a level beyond belief. Trunks was still so small. His father feared that the gravity of the GR would break him, but the boy held himself well and Vegeta had to (privately) admit that he was proud. As hard as it was for the kid to work in the exaggerated gravity, Trunks went through the katas without complaint or mistake. The eyes he’d inherited from his mother always on his father, seeking approval from the man he was certain was the strongest warrior in the universe.

Observing the brat, Vegeta knew when the boy had reached his limit. His son would not admit to his powerful father that he was worn out, so Vegeta took pity on him. The kid had done well and deserved a bit of praise. 

Vegeta hit the control to power down the GR, standing still to listen to the amazing machine whir. Trunks felt the lessening gravity and let himself fall backward on the floor, a puddle of hungry child.

“Get up,” Vegeta said in a little less than his usual gruff tone, “You get two desserts today.”

The big blue eyes under the fringe of lavender hair went wide and Trunks pushed himself up onto his elbows. With a whoosh and a clap, Vegeta found himself the recipient of a tight hug around the leg. 

“I love you, Dad!” exclaimed Trunks against the thick muscle of his father.

Without his express consent his tail swept forward to run over the smooth cap of his son’s head. 

Vegeta carried his son back the compound and set him down in the families living courters with the order to clean up for dinner. Bulma would not allow sweaty Saiyans to sit at her table. The Prince watched the boy bounce off down the hall and then followed. He wanted a shower and out of his tight armour.

Vegeta checked himself at that thought. He was getting soft. There was a time, not so far in the past, when he’d spent all his time dressed in his armour. He’d slept in it and he’d never given it a second thought. Then the Woman had given him the first human clothes he’d ever worn and though the shirt had been pink, it was by far the most comfortable thing to ever grace his skin. He walked into his room and looked at the giant bed. Bulma had outfitted their bed in dark blue silk because she knew it was to his taste. The mattress was softer than Vegeta, having grown up sleeping on little more than camp cots, thought was possible. 

The Prince shed his neoprene sub-armour and walked, naked into the bathing chamber. There was a shower with multiple jets that would pelt him with hot water at will. In the other corner was the sunken tub that had been the stage of many very pleasant moments between him and his wife. With a little smirk, Vegeta decided to take a bath. He really was getting soft.

The water was almost too hot but Vegeta slid into it anyway with relish. He laid back and let his arms and legs float into their natural positions, his spiked head resting against the coolness of the porcelain lip of the basin. 

The door opened. He heard the sound of soft sound of bare feet on the tiled floor of the bathing chamber. He’d known she was coming, her negligible ki proceeded her arrival and he was never unaware of where the Woman was in relation to him. But Vegeta didn’t move or open his eyes. She used the toilet as he knew she would and Vegeta didn’t want to see that. Then there was the sound of cloth against skin and that got his attention. The Prince lifted his head and watched with narrowed, black eyes as Bulma tossed her clothes on the floor and stepped into the hot water.

She didn’t say anything at all and didn’t need to. Vegeta moved his legs, opening them to make room for her. Bulma sat down with her back to him and fitted herself against him, her back to his wide chest. He wrapped his tail around himself to hold his penis against his stomach as that too had been left to float freely in the water. Once she’d settled, Vegeta pulled his arms forward and interlaced his fingers over the Woman’s belly, letting his head fall back again. It was just natural and yet more evidence that he was getting soft. No other being in all the universe would have dared to come into the presence of the Prince of all Saiyans during his personal time and yet his wife didn’t even knock on the door. And he didn’t mind. Marriage.

During dinner Vegeta had to deal with the never-ending chatter of Panchi. The oddball mother of his human wife never stopped talking, even though the only person who bothered to respond was her young and exuberant grandson. Freshly washed and obviously renewed from his intensive training, Trunks went on and on about how much he was looking forward to the next tournament and how badly he intended to trounce Goten. Vegeta listened to this with amusement; he would take a great deal of pleasure in watching his offspring beat the hell out of the Kakarot clone.

He was brought out of this reverie by the unexpected feeling of the sole of a naked foot running up the inside of his thigh. He leveled a dark gaze at his brightly coloured wife. She raised her bowl of miso to her mouth and sipped without changing her expression in the slightest. To anyone but Vegeta, she would have appeared to be impassively enjoying her dinner, but he could see the wicked glint in her sapphire eyes. 

Vegeta had to harden his face. The little foot pressed into the crease where his thigh met the rest of him. His face wasn’t the only thing to harden and she knew it. Under the table, Vegeta wrapped his hand around Bulma’s ankle, so fragile in his large fingers. Bulma lifted her eyebrows and the corner of her mouth lifted just enough to make Vegeta purr deep in the depths of his throat. 

Trunks was loud enough that the soft sound was drowned out in the din of boyish boasting. With his free hand the Prince took a long drink of the soup, the other one squeezed the narrow limb in his lab. He moved the captive foot over and pressed it hard against the erection pressing into the ripped muscles of his lower abdomen. Bulma curled her toes and smirked into her soup. 

It fell to the two of them to do the dishes while Panchi read their son a story before bed. Vegeta dried the plates as he was handed them, moving faster than he needed to in order to grope his wife while her hands were busy in the soapy water. His tail roamed up the backs of her legs and between the rounds of her ass to tease her pinker parts. Vegeta took a step to left and fondled her full breasts, kissing the back of her neck until she squirmed with wanting him.

Marriage was weird.

He’d watched Kakarot for years and the relationship he had with his loud, annoying wife. Though Vegeta did not like the harpy in any way, shape or form, he also didn’t understand how she was still married to his fellow Saiyan. The idiot didn’t even know when his youngest son’s birthday was. Vegeta hadn’t been on Earth when Trunks was born, but he’d made damn sure that he knew his son’s name day. In the privacy of his mind, he regretted that he had not gotten the chance to see Bulma then, heavy with his child in her belly. 

Kakarot seemed to actively avoid contact with his wife. He trained far away from her at every opportunity and, it seemed to Vegeta, was little more than the unwilling recipient of endless tirades whose subject were always his short comings as a husband and parent. He also didn’t understand why Kakarot stayed married to her, but little about the way that idiot thought made sense to the Prince.

Vegeta was endlessly glad that his own new marriage was unlike that in every way. He trained just as hard as his rival and friend but he was happy that there was a warm, loving woman waiting for him when he finished. He loved being able to go to bed and draw her into his arms, all softness and curves and feminine scents. 

It was odd, but in the time since they had stood together before the justice of the peace Vegeta found that he wanted his wife even more, much more often, than before. He couldn’t walk past her without touching her and she never passed by him without reaching out to run her slim fingers over some part of him. Vegeta did not like to be touched in the presence of others but they did it in such a way that anyone else who happened to be there did not see. So treasured were these secret exchanges that Vegeta actually thought he might not care if the whole world saw him with his tail under Bulma’s skirt.

>_>_>_

The time for the Tournament approached and independently all the Z fighters intensified their training. Kakarot and Goten went out into the wilds together, despite the shrilling of an irate Chichi. She was left to content herself with the fact that her studious eldest son opted out of the competition. Krillin and 18 trained together at Kame House. The little, former monk could never hope to reach a level on par with his enhanced wife, but rather than let it bother him, Krillin took pride in the insane strength of his wife. Piccolo kept to himself in the badlands or at the Lookout, seen by none of the others. 

Vegeta spent part of everyday with his son. Trunks was earnest in his desire to compete, though as Vegeta pointed out there was not a child on the planet that could hope to give him a solid match with the exception of his best friend. That was the point, Trunks told him with a very Saiyan glimmer in his eyes. He wanted to beat Goten. Badly. Vegeta really loved that kid.

It occurred to him that he had never seen Goten fight. It would be, he thought, a good idea to observe the boy. It was always an advantage to have a sense of the style of one’s opponent. Kakarot was still hiding from his wife somewhere in the mountains, so Vegeta went to Bulma to see if she had a way to get a hold of her best friend. He wanted a spar himself.

He found her in her lower lab, working as usual. She threw a tarp over whatever project she was elbow deep in when she heard the chime that announced his presence. Curious, Vegeta tried to get her to let him see but she adamantly refused, and he gave it up after a moment. She would show him when she was ready. 

This was another of the looks he liked best on his wife. Her lab coat was open, and its pockets were heavily weighted down with various tools and what-nots. There was a streak of something dark blue on her throat as though she had been massaging her neck with an inky hand, teal hair in a high ponytail. He came up behind her and maneuvered her in one of her wheeled chairs with her back to him. Vegeta meted his strength carefully so as not to hurt her and began to rub the tension out of her shoulders and neck, pulling his gloves off to feel her warm skin.

She sighed and let her head fall back to rest against his stomach. So trusting. These same hands had choked the life out of endless lifeforms and yet she bared her tiny throat to him without a second thought. 

Marriage was… hot.

Little by little the tightness in her shoulders left her until the tone of his touch changed subtly. Vegeta persisted, making no pretense about wanting her right then and there. He reached down over her shoulder blades and dipped his hands into her shirt, running his thumbs over her nipples. A new sort of tension made her breathing deepen; that was one of her favourite caresses and never failed to get a response. Her arms came up over her head and she pulled her husband down, tilting back to kiss him. Hard. 

Vegeta promptly forgot the exact reason he’d come in the lab in the first place and whipped his wife out of her chair to press her up against the wall, pulling her lab coat off. His tail pushed her shirt up and he nuzzled his face into the soft flesh of her chest. Three minutes later the rest of her clothes and most of his armour were in a pile on the floor and he was glad the lab was soundproof. 

_ Lusty, little Wife. _

Eventually, Vegeta did recall his original reason for invading her space and she told him to simply flare his ki in a secession of pulses. It was the agreed upon signal and it would get Kakarot’s attention. Vegeta wondered if there were always going to be things she had thought of that he’d never considered. He rather hoped so, having a genius around all the time made things interesting.t The Prince watched her button her lab coat over her naked body with admiration. She was so pliant sometimes. Bulma decided she wanted a break and a bath, not really minding his intrusion. He followed her out of the laboratory, wondering absently if other people took time during the day for what she called ‘quickies’ as they so often did. The not-so-asshole part of him certainly hoped they did.

Trunks was waiting in the practice yard. The kid made no attempt to hide his impatience with the father who had told him over 45 minutes before that he would be right back. Vegeta was in too good a mood to be bothered by the pouty look on the face of his progeny, which disappeared instantly when he informed the kid that he planned on trying to summon Kakarot and Goten to practice with them. 

Vegeta rose into the air until he was high over the Capsule Corp Compound and drew his ki in until he had what he needed to turn. It exploded out of him in a blinding flash of golden light that warmed and thrilled him. Eyes closed he revolved slowly in the sky until he located the unique signature that was his fellow Saiyan. In that direction, Vegeta send the pulse waves of ki that Bulma assured him would act like a beacon. After a few minutes he felt the unmistakable answering waves of ki that could be no one other than Kakarot. 

He waited until he felt the change that meant the Saiyan was moving towards him and then returned to the ground, staying in his golden form to give Kakarot an easier target. There he was again, going soft by doing anything to make anything easier for the idiot. Bulma had a very strange effect on Vegeta.

He went through the katas of his routine with his son, waiting for the others to arrive. Bulma came out of the house just before Kakarot landed, freshly washed and changed. She gathered Trunks for a bit of mommy coddling, which he promptly attempted to wiggle out of, protesting that he wasn’t a baby in need of kisses. Not in front of his dad, anyway. She released him with good grace, smiling at Vegeta over shoulder. 

Kakarot and Goten landed gently in the grass of the practice field a few moments later. They looked around curiously, obviously wanting to know the reason for the summons. Vegeta backed away, leaning against a tree with the heel of one boot hooked into the bark and crossed his arms over his chest. Bulma greeted her friend and Trunks ran in to smack Goten in the chest. Trunks explained that they wanted to train, Bulma explaining that nothing was wrong. Kakarot looked over to Vegeta with a friendly wave of his hand and looked pleased to get a slight nod in return. 

The boys wasted no time, ranging far enough away from their parents so they could effectively throw each other around without hitting any one or anything. Bulma came towards Vegeta’s tree, close enough so that he could feel the heat of her through his clothing and ran her tongue up the underside of his throat, her naughtiness hidden by the blue fall of her hair. She admonished him to play nicely and retreated to the set of lawn chairs to soak up some much needed sunlight and watch.

Vegeta was still distracted, watching her, when Kakarot materialized beside him. They stood in a mostly companionable silence for a while, each of them taking stock of the way the boys sparred with each other. Trunks was the taller of the two with a longer reach and he hit harder, his father having already forbidden the use of ki for the day. They would not be able to use it during the Tournament, nor would they be able to fly. Goten was faster and rather better at defense. Trunks, true to his bloodline, went instantly into attack mode, throwing a blurring barrage of punches and kicks that set Goten into a messy number of dodges. 

Vegeta smirked after a quarter of an hour of observation. Goten had exactly the same weakness as his father. He was over-confident and that left him with gaping holes in his defense when he decided to try an opening on Trunks. The lavender haired boy saw this, much to Vegeta’s pleasure and caught Goten with a solid blow to the mid-section under his out-stretched arm. Goten huffed in pain and went down. 

Both the Prince and Kakarot came off their relaxed postures, ready to intervene. But it was unnecessary. Trunks had no real wish to hurt his friend and stopped his attack the moment Goten’s knees hit the ground. He took the younger boys face in his small hands and lifted it, reassuring himself that Goten was not really hurt. Vegeta shook his head in an almost amused way. His son had not gotten that kind streak from him. Trunks flopped down on the ground to catch his breath, giving Goten the chance to do the same. 

When he felt the flare of ki from the man beside him, Vegeta silently accepted the invitation and went out into the field with the full intension of damaging his rival. But his heart just wasn’t in it. 

Yep, he thought, going god’s damned soft.

They sparred. There were a lot of punches and kicks that found their mark but it ended up being more of a game than anything else. The boys joined them, and they fought in teams. Bulma sipped something fruity with a frilly little umbrella in it and just enjoyed the spectacle of male prowess. There was a lot of laughter from the boys, Kakarot wore his perpetual, good natured grin and even Vegeta lacked the severe lines that usually drew his face. They would all bear the marks of the training session for a few days, but also seemed to simply be having fun. 

The flurry of motion and sounded stopped suddenly and all four Saiyans turned to stare in the same direction, all still in their various postures as though hit by some sort of freezing ray. Bulma laughed out loud, knowing exactly what had gotten their collective attention. She’d had the forethought to order an enormous amount of take away and the scents wafting from the arriving truck load of food was what their alien senses were tracking. It was funny to see.

They all looked at one another and straighten up in a unit, the spar on pause as something more important became the priority. Food.

Vegeta turned away from the laden truck bouncing up the unpaved road and looked at his wife. She gave him a lopsided smile. He loved that Woman. Loved how well she knew them, how quietly she did things that only someone who paid attention to the natures of her Saiyans would think to do. 

The food was laid out on blankets. Then it was attacked as if it were trying to escape. Kakarot and Goten tossed their weighted clothes aside where they were joined by the rigid breastplates from Trunks and Vegeta. Bulma kept up a lively conversation, getting Kakarot to describe his training regimen for the benefit of her husband. Vegeta filed each gleaned fact away for later consideration. Kakarot had been training with his son under water to increase their stamina, a trick he’d learned from the Prince himself. Which Vegeta thought was a bit on the dirty side but also couldn’t blame the man. It was, after all, a brilliant idea and very effective. Trunks would be spending a lot more time in the GR. He wouldn’t have his son lose a match because his opponent out lasted his wind.

Bulma was very sneaky, a trait to be greatly admired. Nothing she said was forced as she got Kakarot to give away all the information her husband would need. ‘Goku’ might be her best friend but the Woman knew exactly where her loyalties lie. Vegeta sat by her side, his thigh pressed to hers and let his tail snake up her back. In response, Bulma put a hand inside the neck of her t-shirt as though she were innocently adjusting the garment, but she leaned just enough to the side that Vegeta was gifted with a tantalizing view of creamy cleavage in a red lace bra. 

Vegeta and Kakarot were discussing the various merits of the absent members of their group of friends, still eating, when something flitted across the edge of Vegeta’s awareness. He stopped talking, mid-sentence. Kakarot’s eyes widened and he turned to extend his senses, feeling the same thing the Prince sought. After a second he relaxed and went back to his lunch, not bothered by the approaching ki.

Vegeta could not say the same. The muscles of his back tensed and he put the plate in his lap on the blanket. Bulma looked at him, one hand curving around the base of his tail. Vegeta shook himself, reminded that he was not required to like her friends. At least not all of them. Reminding himself that he had promised, years ago, not to murder the one closing in on his territory now.

Yamcha.

He muttered the name darkly under his breath. Bulma tipped her face upward, looking for the streak in the air that would be her ex-boyfriend. She sighed in a long-suffering way. While she had long since forgiven the former bandit for being the worse boyfriend in the world, she did not like the way Vegeta reacted to his presence. In her opinion, Yamcha had done her a great favour in being an unfaithful bottom feeder. If he’d been even marginally less awful, she might not have broken their relationship off. She might never have given herself the chance to fall in love with her Prince. She might never have known what it was like to be worshipped by a man who would die to protect her. Who did die; for her.

Vegeta on the other hand, had nothing but disgust and disdain for the man. He was a baseball player, for Dende’s sake. He played a pointless game for a living. Vegeta would, if pressed, acknowledge that Yamcha was one of the most powerful humans in the world. Only Roshi and Krillin (Vegeta still wasn’t sure what the hell Tienshinhan was) were stronger than he was. But that didn’t make him worthy of respect. Vegeta had seen him fight. He’d been blown up in the first five minutes by a creature that Vegeta had been able to vanquish without breaking a sweat by the age of 6. 

And Yamcha had caused Bulma pain. That was not forgivable. The Prince had been there to see how she had suffered when he’d died. He’d heard the broken sobs that came from her chambers after the fights they’d had once he was resurrected. He’d smelled the other women on the man; unable to believe that he would bring such taint into the presence of a woman such as his Bulma. There was nothing in the universe, short of a wish on the Dragon Balls (and that was iffy, even Shenron had limits) that would change his opinion of the beta male. Vegeta looked up, able to see much further than the Woman. He would not even have to power up to blow that bum out of the sky. 

Vegeta gently removed the small hand from his lower back and got up. By the time Yamcha landed, Vegeta was once again under his tree, arms locked in place over his breastplate to keep his hands out of sight. He closed his eyes and centered himself, ignoring the greetings given back and forth among the people still sitting on the blankets. 

Yamcha explained that he’d felt the surges of ki coming from the compound and had worried that something was wrong. It obviously didn’t occur to him how stupid that sounded. Vegeta had sent out the invitation to Kakarot hours before. If anything had been wrong, Yamcha had made certain he would have missed the action. His excuse…a very important photo shoot for a magazine no one ever heard of. He was glad, of course, that all was well.

Vegeta listened, eyes still closed. A vicious smile curved his mouth when he learned that the beta male intended to join the ranks of fighters in the Tournament. He buried sharp fangs in his lower lip to stop himself laughing. Vegeta’s new fondest hope was that he would be paired with Yamcha. He would be willing to bribe an official or ten to make that happen. 

He was still mentally masturbating to the plethora of ways he could break vital bones in the puny human man when a sharp cry of surprise from Bulma startled him. Vegeta’s black eyes flew open and focused on her. And the soon to be dead man with his arms around her waist.

Several things happened very fast. The tree behind Vegeta went up in a mushroom cloud; the percussion blast that turned him into a flaming, golden demon flattening everything within 50 yards and sinking the ground under his feet into a crater. The boys both yelled in fear and shot off the ground. Kakarot glanced in one direction and then the other, his eyes turning blue and his spiked hair lifting as he changed. Yamcha turned a rapid and gross shade of light green in the split second before Bulma punched him in the face.

Vegeta had no really coherent thoughts, he reacted with the instinct of a natural born warrior.

“Get your _FUCKING_ hands off my _WIFE!”_

There was a thunderclap and a hurricane’s worth of wind, the only visible thing Vegeta left in his wake when he launched himself at Yamcha. Something in his brain caught up with his body and he realized that Bulma was still tangled in the embrace of his prey. Yamcha would loose his head in the onslaught. But Bulma would also be hurt. Vegeta pulled up with all his strength and it was just enough for Kakarot to set the solid strength of his Super Saiyan form between them.

The collision was deafening. Yamcha and Bulma were thrown backwards. Chest to chest with Kakarot, Vegeta strained to move the man and get to the breakable human woman who was his world before she could hit the ground. Not understanding, Kakarot grappled with Vegeta, screaming at him to stop. Power like none he had ever been able to conjure nearly melted both Saiyans in its intensity, like a super nova blasting itself apart. Kakarot was collateral damage and Vegeta didn’t waste a thought on whether or not he had just killed the man. Faster than he had ever moved, the Prince cut through the air like a beam of light. 

He caught her in midair, holding her slender body against his chest and spinning to take the force out of the impact. Just slamming into his chest at that speed would have been enough to severely injure, if not kill her. 

Bulma found herself, dizzy and sick, turning in decreasing circles 10 feet above the ground. She didn’t know what the hell had just happened, but she recognized that she was being held tightly by the man she loved. She wrapped her arms around his neck, shaking, too disoriented to speak. She couldn’t open her eyes, the man holding her was too bright, but she turned her face when she felt a pair of small hands on her cheeks. Trunks. His voice trembled, trying to ask if she was alright. He sounded so young and afraid…it brought her back to her senses. Reaching out in his direction, she embraced him as best she could without being to see him, assuring him in a steady voice that she was indeed, just fine. She hoped she wasn’t lying to her son.

Vegeta looked down at his family. Trunks was stricken, his father’s actions had terrified him with their violence. His wife clung to him, shaking and wane, for all the show she was putting on for her son.

Vegeta squashed his ki, forcing the light surrounding him to dim and the sweeping aura to calm to a dull roar. Turning, he remembered the collision with Kakarot. Very fortunately, the man seemed not be too badly damaged. He had been blown right out of his Super form and laid on the grass, face up, speaking quietly to Goten; the boy had the same look about him as Trunks. 

When his blue eyes fell on the last member of their party, they narrowed dangerously. Yamcha was crumpled in a heap on the other side of the field. Vegeta very slowly descended, trying to give himself time to decide what to do.

Bulma opened her eyes when she felt the massive Saiyan aura dim. Vegeta looked every inch a murderous Crown Prince in that moment. His chin was tilted up in an arrogant position, he stared down the knife blade of his nose at Yamcha with a tight expression, his soft lips compressed into a flat line and his brows drawn together. He was all at once terrible and beautiful. Once his boots touched down, Bulma took his face and turned it towards her. For a moment, his homicidal countenance scared her. Then, his glacial blue eyes darkened, he shuddered. By the time the Prince had strode to the upset lawn chairs, fixed one and deposited her into it his hair and eyes were back to the midnight luster she found herself the most drawn to. Oddly, Vegeta plucked Trunks up off the ground and held the boy for a moment, forehead to forehead. He held Bulma’s gaze for a long moment, tucked the kid onto her lap and turned to Kakarot. 

Bulma wanted to go to her friend. He hadn’t risen from the furrow in which he laid. But she didn’t think her wobbly legs would hold her, yet. Vegeta flashed faster than she could follow and reappeared at the side of the supine man. Goten looked frightened and actually raised his fists, spreading his legs as though he could keep the older man away from his father. Bulma could not hear what was said, but Kakarot reached up and tugged his little son out of the way. His chocolate coloured tail twinned itself comfortingly around Goten’s. The kid subsided and let Vegeta pull his father into a sitting position. The taller man certainly looked the worse for wear, his face bloody and his gi torn. Taking the point-blank rage of an incensed Prince wasn’t something even he could walk away from without showing it. Vegeta made a gesture, a hand on Kakarot’s shoulder. They appeared to argue for a moment and Vegeta looked back at Bulma. He shrugged and flashed out of sight again.

The Woman tried to slow her hitched breathing, concentrating on smoothing the rumpled hair of the boy in her lap. She murmured to him quietly. She wanted him to know everything would be alright.

Vegeta wasn’t gone longer than a minute. She caught the streak of dark blue that resolved into his graceful body back at Kakarot’s side. He held a small brown sac in his hand and after fishing a small green bean out of it, gave it to his friend. Kakarot crunched it, froze for a couple of heartbeats and stood up. He used the ruined and singed front of his gi to wipe his face, magically restored to perfect health by the inexplicable properties of the Senzu. He held out a hand to Vegeta, a challenging look on his handsome face. 

She knew what they were talking about this time and would not have been surprised if Vegeta had denied the request. But he didn’t. Goku took the little bean and flew over to the pile of mostly decimated Yamcha. A distinct moan came from her ex when his twisted limbs were straightened out and the bean was forced between his lips. He took much longer to recover than Kakarot.

Vegeta and his fellow Saiyan exchanged a few more words. For some reason Goku was smiling in a very pleased way, slapping Vegeta on the chest. Kakarot made a bow in Bulma’s direction. He settled Goten onto his shoulders, went to where Yamcha stood trying desperately to blend in with the scenery and look anywhere but at Bulma or Vegeta. He put a hand on Yamcha’s shoulder, two fingers from the other hand to his forehead and vanished. 

Vegeta had not moved. He stood straight as an arrow, facing away from his family. He wasn’t sure how he felt. It went against every instinct he possessed to have first facilitated the healing of the man whose blood he wanted to spill and second to then have let him leave without so much as the most dire and sincere of warnings against ever touching Bulma again in anyway what so ever. He had however, instructed Kakarot to deliver this edict-neither of the men trusted Vegeta to go near Yamcha just then and maybe ever in the future.

Bulma steeled herself and was happy to find that her legs didn’t tremble when she stood. Holding Trunks by the hand she made her way across the field. He wouldn’t look at her. He was waiting for her famous temper to take over. Vegeta knew that, from her perspective, he deserved to sleep on the roof for the next month. He had attacked and nearly killed one of her oldest friends. In front of their son. He had scared the living shit out of Goten and hurt Goku badly enough to require a magical intervention. He had very nearly killed her, for all that that part was inadvertent. And so, he waited.

An arm around his waist was the last thing he expected. His son taking hold of his gloved hand was a close second on that short list. A heavy pressure seemed to press on his heart, finding its way up into his throat. It hurt. In the best way.

Much later, in the privacy of their bedroom Bulma curled up against him with her back to his front. He held her very carefully, intensely grateful that she was no more than a little stiff from the events of the day. She really was remarkably resilient, telling him it was nothing a hot bath and a good sleep couldn’t fix. That she loved him. That she understood why he’d lost his mind. That he never had to worry about any other man touching her and if he’d only given her another moment to regroup, she would have punched Yamcha a second time. 

It made him smile into her hair to think of her breaking her fist on the jaw of that fuck knuckle; the feisty little Woman would have done it anyway. 

Bulma had heard, very clearly, the words that came out in a roar just before her Prince had turned his body into a ballistic missile. His public claiming of her. Her breathing hiccupped at that and he felt hot tears trickle over his bicep. He found that he didn’t care. Not that she cried for it, that bothered him enough to make him tighten around her. He didn’t care that everyone would now know. Kakarot had congratulated him on finally making official what all their friends assumed was just a matter of time. And if he knew, he would tell Chichi. That busy body was probably already on the phone with anyone who would answer to gossip about them. There wasn’t a lot to do when one lived approximately four miles the literal middle of nowhere. Bulma warned him to prepare for the inundation of well wishes she knew were coming. Vegeta didn’t care anymore, he’d put up with it as long as none of them came from Yamcha.

Bulma drew the length of his tail over her hip and ran her hands over the silky fur, enjoying the vibration of his purring against her back. She knew she should be angry. Somehow, though, it just wasn’t in her to feel it. In his way, Vegeta had been defending her honour and the sanctity of her person. 

Defending his _Wife._

He loved her. Really loved her. The great destroyer of worlds, Crowned Prince of all Saiyans…was hers.

Vegeta took deep lungful’s of the scent that uniquely Bulma, letting the way she stroked his tail sooth him. She was making him swear not to kill Yamcha, again. Vegeta let her have that promise. When it came to the beta male, killing him wasn’t even close to worst the creative mind of the Prince could come up with. All he needed was a soundproof room, a pair of gardening shears, some Senzu and a few days when she thought he was off training. Humans were fragile but it also amazing what they could live through in the hands of a skilled and patient former member of the Freeza Force.

Bulma had never wondered what happened to the overly obsessed stalker who used to be her intern at Capsule Corp. She had finally fired the stupid jackball, tired of finding ways to deal with his unwanted, endless and creepy advances. The Woman was too confident to allow such a thing to upset her, only mentioning the perv to Vegeta in passing. She was far more certain of her invincibility than he was. Sure enough, while watching her from a distance, Vegeta had caught sight of the greasy freak doing exactly the same thing. Only closer. And with obviously quite different intensions. 

The wrath of the Prince had been swift and decisive. He’d doubted the revolting young man would be missed. He’d been right. 

Vegeta had given his oath to his wife that he would not keep secrets from her, and he meant to keep that promise. It didn’t count, in his mind, if he’d disposed of some worthless bag of dicks that posed a threat to his woman _before_ they were married. He had acted to keep her safe. If he was honest with himself, he would not hesitate to do it again, consequences be damned.

Vegeta was so relaxed, so glad that the day was over and that he wasn’t on the roof. He jumped when a knock sounded at the door. There was only one person who would dare such a thing. He knew the planet wasn’t about to be blown up and the house wasn’t on fire, so he laid back down. His son’s ki flared slightly. The kid was anxious. Bulma called out, telling him it was okay to come in. 

The door opened tentatively, and a small face appeared in the crack. Finding his parents simply lying together in their bed, not looking angry at all gave him courage to slip inside. He had not been able to stay asleep. He kept drifting into bad dreams; all sound and shimmering light and fear. 

Trunks was not afraid of his father; he knew the protective Prince would never hurt him or his mother. He would never let anyone harm them while he had one breath left in his body. But he had hurt Son Goku. And he’d been two seconds from turning Yamcha into a blood-spattered memory. Unlike Bulma, Trunks could sense ki. Young though he was, he knew exactly what had almost happened. One could not be the offspring of two such incredibly intelligent people without inheriting an unnatural amount of brains. He hoped he never felt such murderous rage come from Vegeta ever again. It made a thermo-nuclear bomb look like a package of Poprocks. That scared him.

Bulma took in the face of the boy she loved more than anything and lifted the blankets in front of her. Trunks took two stepped and stopped, his eyes fixed on his father’s. Vegeta let his mouth curve up at the corners and gave an almost imperceivable nod. It was all the invitation he needed. Trunks ran and jumped, throwing himself into the bed with all the trust of a small child. 

Vegeta folded one arm under his head, resting his chin in the silky fall of blue tresses. He felt Bulma wrap herself around Trunks, cradling him with motherly love. Trunks was asleep in moments. Bulma was gone to her dreams not long after. Vegeta didn’t sleep for a long time. He tucked his tail around them both, his arm curved over his family, holding them close to his heart. Listening to them breathing in the dark, safe and secure. He thought about his life up until that point. None of it mattered anymore. This was his life now. This Woman and this boy. His Wife and his Son. 

Marriage was weird.

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't hate me because of the way I treated poor Yamcha. I have no animosity towards the guy personally, I am just relatively certain that Vegeta does and it is from his POV that I tried to write. At least he lived...this time.


End file.
